


Dangerous Thing

by RosiePaw



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-01
Updated: 2010-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-05 15:09:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosiePaw/pseuds/RosiePaw
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I'm happy to acknowledge inspirational debts to lamardeuse's <a href="http://lamardeuse.dreamhost.com/sg/fashionvictim.html">Fashion Victim</a> and sgamadison's <a href="http://sgamadison.livejournal.com/11630.html">Alternative Medicine</a>.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Dangerous Thing

**Author's Note:**

> I'm happy to acknowledge inspirational debts to lamardeuse's [Fashion Victim](http://lamardeuse.dreamhost.com/sg/fashionvictim.html) and sgamadison's [Alternative Medicine](http://sgamadison.livejournal.com/11630.html).

After the last student finally left, he contemplated banging his head against his desk until he passed out.  He also contemplated stalking into his first class the next day, slamming his hand down on the lectern and bellowing at the students to stop asking him what was going to be on the exam, the goddamn exam didn’t _matter_, what _mattered_ was knowledge and the ability to apply it.

Deep down, he knew he wasn’t going to follow either course of action.  Both were fantasies.  The mess spread across his desk was all too real.  At least three half-empty cups of cold coffee were visible – which meant that more were hidden – amidst piles of books and journals, not one but two laptops and drifts of paper.  Half the paper was administrivia.  God, he hated paperwork.

On the bright side, the day was done.  He’d might as well go home.  It would all still be there tomorrow.  On the dark side... it would all still be there tomorrow.  Along with – oh, hell, was there a faculty meeting tomorrow?

He looked up from the chaos of his desktop towards the calendar pinned on the wall.  Instead he found himself staring at someone’s ass.  A male someone’s extremely attractive khaki-clad ass.  Its owner appeared to be studying the various bits of paper pinned to the corkboard on the wall.  The guy must have just walked in.

“May I help you?”

The visitor spun around, blue eyes wide and startled.  “John!”  The impression that he was about to throw himself across the desk was so strong that John stepped back, hands held up before him.  The other man froze and stammered, “Sheppard?  Uh, Dr. Sheppard?”

“Nope, Mr. Sheppard.  Never did get the doctorate.  And you are...?”

“You don’t know me.”  Mystery Man seemed surprised by this.  “Rodney McKay.  Dr. Rodney McKay.  Not medical, astrophysics and mechanical engineering.”

“Two doctorates?  We average each other out.  How can I help you, Dr. McKay?”

“But you _were_ in the Air Force, right?”

What the?  John narrowed his eyes and regarded “Dr. McKay” with growing suspicion.  “No, I wasn’t.  Perhaps you’ve got the wrong John Sheppard?”

“With that hair?  Not unless something screwed up somewhere, which of course wouldn’t be anything new around here, and this is an alternate universe instead of a –  No, can’t be, a wormhole to an alternate universe would require a lot more energy and the usage profile would be completely different.  You’ve got to be our – Sheppard, you come with me, we’ll get you out of here.”

Okay, this guy was seriously weird.  “Dr. McKay, I don’t know who you are or why you’re here.  You seem to think you know me, but you’ve already made two wrong guesses.  Three if we count your assumption that I’m going _anywhere_ with you.”

“Any _guesses_ I’ve made have been _educated_ guesses based on existing data.  We know there’s at least one universe in which you _do_ have a doctorate.  And you _are_ an Air Force pilot in our – uh, somewhere else.  Huh, if you neither got your doctorate nor joined the Air Force, what happened instead?  You dropped out of grad school to have more time for surfing?”

Too near the bone.  John’s temper flared.  “Get.  Out.  I’m calling campus security.”

“I know this sounds strange, but they told me not to over-explain, just to try and persuade you to come with me.  Look, Sheppard – John!  You have to...”

“Trust you?  Why should I trust you, Dr. McKay?”  John was about to add, “I don’t even _know_ you,” when he realized that McKay had deflated almost instantaneously, his attitude morphing from belligerence to misery.  John was quick to follow up on the advantage.  “There’s the door.  Leave.  Now.”

Broad shoulders slumped, McKay opened his mouth, paused, shut it and left.

John waited long enough to let him get clear, then phoned in a report to campus security just in case “Dr. McKay” – hmmm, a take-off on Dr. McCoy?  The talk about wormholes and alternate universes suggested a deranged science fiction geek...  Anyway, if the strange guy with the great ass tried to hassle anyone else on the community college campus, security would deal with him.

John had had enough for the day.  The late afternoon sunlight was streaming though the window, and the sky was clear.  A long run would settle his mind.  He packed up, locked the office and left, noting on his way out that McKay hadn’t lingered.

***

_“I screwed it up completely.  I found myself standing in front of a wall, with a papers pinned to a corkboard.  When I turned around, he was right there.  I was, uh, kind of relieved.  Okay, I almost hugged him.  Except that he didn’t know me, so he got spooked, I got flustered, and everything went downhill from there.”_

***

Billy’s was quiet at this time of evening, before the younger crowd filled the place up.  It was pleasant spot for a beer or three after a long afternoon spent grading exams.  The exams themselves hadn’t been all that bad, especially first-term calculus.  Some of the students who’d been on the verge of dropping the course at the beginning of the term had managed to stick with it and make it through.  A few were obviously university material – if only he could convince _them_ of that, help them navigate the labyrinth of admissions and financial aid. 

John gave the bartender a nod, settled down on his usual stool with his usual Molson’s.  He could never quite remember where and when he’d acquired a taste for Canadian beer.  It had been a while ago.  Two guys were shooting a desultory round of pool at the tables towards the back.  Otherwise the place was empty.

The beer was about half gone when, out of the corner of his eye, John saw someone else sit down further along the bar.  Thinking it might be someone he knew, he turned to say hello.  Shit!  Dr. McWeirdo.  Looking right at him.  And ordering a Molson’s for himself, as if trying to establish some sort of camaraderie.

“I, uh, would like to apologize for what happened the other day.  The whole thing was a, uh, misunderstanding.”

 John took another sip of beer, not giving the guy any help.  And of course, the bartender was oh-so-carefully _not_ listening to the conversation.  The community here wasn’t large, so just about everything was grist for the gossip mill.

“You were right.  I _was_ looking for someone else.  I’m here on some business for, uh, the government, and I was supposed to meet someone and... things got screwed up.”

“You know, McKay, I think I might be insulted by your estimation of my intelligence.  If you followed me in here expecting me to buy that story, you’re wasting your time.”

“I did not follow you in here!”

“Right, your government-issued list of contacts just happened to include the local gay bar.  You’re planning to what?  ‘Meet someone’ here tonight?  Bet you hope things don’t get ‘screwed up’ this time.”

Flushed was a good look on McKay or would have been if the guy weren’t some kind of weirdo stalker. “No, that’s not why...  I heard about this place at, uh, the hotel I’m staying at!  I asked about, y’know, places to go, and they told me about it.”

Hmmm, that was semi-plausible.  McKay certainly didn’t seem to be freaked out at discovering that he’d followed John into a gay bar.  Of course that might only mean that he was a weirdo stalker who happened to be gay.  John finished his beer, thought about leaving.  Leaving felt like letting McKay chase him out of his own territory, so instead John ordered another beer.

“I’ll get that!”  McKay, reaching towards his pants pocket.  John stared, waved him off, paid for the beer himself.

“I can pay for my own beer, Dr. McKay.”

“I, uh, didn’t mean it like that.  I was trying to make up for being an asshole.”

Yeah, sure.  “So, you’re in town on some kind of government business.  Presumably something to do with astrophysics and/or mechanical engineering?”

“Yes.  But.  It’s, uh, classified.”

“That’s convenient.”

McKay’s flush renewed itself.  Definitely a good look on him, with those eyes.  And those solid arms and shoulders.  The fact was that taking verbal pokes at the guy wouldn’t have been half as fun if he hadn’t been so attractive.

“So tell me something about yourself, McKay.  Something non-classified.”

This was how John came to learn about McKay’s cat (currently staying with a neighbour), McKay’s miserable childhood in a Toronto suburb – huh, maybe the Molson’s had just been a coincidence – McKay’s childhood piano lessons (abruptly discontinued when his teacher made remarks about his lack of artistry) and McKay’s visit from the CIA after building an atomic bomb for a school fair.

“Yeah, I can see why they might have been just a bit concerned, McKay.”

“It’s not as if it was a _working_ model!”

The saga continued with McKay’s entry into university in his mid-teens, which eventually led to him getting his second doctorate at about the age most people were _graduating_ university.

“So I take it you’re some kind of genius?”

“I’m not ‘some kind of’ genius, I _am_ a genius.”      

“Who screws up on details like making sure he’s got the right person when he’s meeting someone to discuss classified government business.”

“Uh, yeah.  I’m not good with people.”

John, by now on his third beer, threw back his head and laughed.  Okay, McKay was definitely weird, but maybe he wasn’t a stalker after all.  He was no hardship to look at and fun to listen to, with his crazy stories, his earnest manner and his swooping hand gestures.  Not that John trusted the guy any more than he had before, but sitting at a bar listening to McKay talk wasn’t the worst way to pass an evening.

The beers were catching up with John, so he excused himself to go use the washroom.  He noticed as he came back that the place was beginning to fill up, but it wasn’t until he was almost to the bar that he saw that McKay had company, specifically Blair.  Shit. 

Blair was a local guy, an idiot who wouldn’t take “no” for an answer, especially after he’d had a few.  The vacuous grin on his face as he leaned too far into McKay’s space suggested he was well beyond “a few”.  Not that McKay couldn’t handle the situation, but somehow John found himself thinking he shouldn’t _have to_.  It seemed natural to walk up behind McKay, put a hand on his shoulder and lean down to ask, “You ready to leave now, buddy?”

McKay looked startled.  Blair looked pissed off.  The bartender looked wary – fights weren’t good for business.  But then McKay stood up, smiling nervously and stammering, “Yes, right, let’s go!” 

So they went.  Out the door, along the dark street.  It began to dawn on John that McKay, self-admittedly “not good with people”, might not realize that John had only been giving him an escape route, hadn’t meant anything more. 

“Uh, McKay, about what happened in there...”

“In there.  Right.  I’m sorry I didn’t realize you were leading up to – I was surprised when – but it’s fine!  I just, uh, I never thought you – anyway.  This is fine.  I’m supposed to connect with you somehow and this would certainly be one way to – uh, I didn’t mean that the way it may have sounded.”   

“Really.”  John kept his tone dry, trying not to laugh.

“No, really.  I’m supposed to – look, the whole point of this is to get you to come with me.”

“_Really,_” John drawled, just to hear the other man sputter.  God, what would McKay’s face look like right now through a pair of night vision goggles? 

“What are you, twelve?  Never mind – shutting up now!”  John started counting steps.  Sure enough, nineteen steps later: “Where are we going?”

“Don’t know, McKay.  Where do you want to go?”

“You _don’t know_?  You were the one who suggested we leave!”

“You were the one who said yes,” John observed as they reached the corner and started to cross.

“So now you expect me to make up for the fact that you’ve leapt into action without having a clear plan of...”

“Shit!”

The car had come out of nowhere, rounding the corner at an insanely high speed and heading straight towards them.  John shoved McKay forward, out of the way, then threw himself after the other man.  They both hit the pavement sprawling as the car roared past their prone bodies and vanished down the street.

“Get _off_ me, you moron!”

“Hey, you’re welcome, McKay!”

“Right, thanks so much for scraping all the skin off my knees and shins, Sheppard!  Please tell me you at least got the license plate number.”

“I was too damn busy trying to save our lives.  Next time I’ll revise my priorities,” John snarled.  It took him a moment to hear what he’d said – _next_ time?

“Sheppard?  Are you listening to me?  Ohmigod, did you hit your head?  Do you have a concussion?  Let me see your eyes, I need to check your pupils.”

“I do not have a concussion, McKay!  And we’re still sitting in the middle of the goddamn street!  Now move it!”

“At the risk of reigniting our previous argument, where are we going?”

“_You_ are going back to your hotel.  _I_ am walking you there to make sure you don’t get hit by any other lunatic drivers and then I am going home.”

“Sheppard, we need to talk about...”

“We need to _walk_, McKay!  Which hotel are you staying at?”

For some reason the simple question seemed to fluster McKay as much as the near-accident.  “Oh, uh, the, uh, the big one?”

That figured.  No money for community colleges, plenty of money to put government employees up in fancy hotels.  “Fine, I’ll walk you there.  Move.”

***

_“So he walked me to lobby of the Hilton.  Took me right inside.  I had to wait until he left before I could get out of there.  Look, I still think someone else should go the next time.  We’ve got to have someone with the gene who’s better with people than I am.  I know the theory was that as his closest friend I’d be the best choice, but that’s useless because he doesn’t_ recognize_ me.  I told him about almost my entire _life _without triggering any recognition.  And he certainly doesn’t _trust_ me.” _

***

John had never been into shopping for shopping’s sake, but the FOR SALE sign in the store window caught his eye that bright Saturday morning.  He did enough running to wear out shoes quickly, and his current pair was approaching the end of their useful lives.  The store had the brand he liked, and that pair there in the window display...

When a flicker in the window caught his attention, he recognized the reflection of the man standing behind him.  Sheppard spun around and grabbed the guy’s arm hard enough to bruise.

“McKay, what the _hell_ is going on here?”

“Let go of me, Sheppard!  Ow!  I thought we’d moved on from the hostile stage!”

“Yeah, that was before you lied to me.  I called ‘your’ hotel the next day to check on you.  They had no record of anyone meeting your description staying there, either currently or recently.”

“Which wouldn’t have been a problem if you hadn’t called the hotel in the first place!  What led you to do _that_?”

“Gee, I don’t know.  Maybe I just wanted to make sure you hadn’t died of blood poisoning from your scraped knees?”

“Oh.  Well. Thank you.  Now let go of me!”

“Not without an explanation.”

“That would apparently violate some sort of pseudo-scientific voodoo, something about your mind needing to retain control of your own perceptions and form your own interpretations.  They told me to avoid it if at all possible.”

“It’s not possible and I don’t care who told you what!  I want the whole story and I want it...”

Later on, John couldn’t remember what had tipped him off.  Maybe the sound of the first impact – but that didn’t make sense, how the hell would he know to recognize the sound of a bullet striking brick and plate glass?  There wasn’t even time to yell.  He grabbed McKay, shoved him to the ground and dropped on top of him, hearing the glass window shatter above them, hearing people start to scream.

The spray of gunfire was brief.  Once it was over, John cautiously raised his head, letting the glass shards slide off of him rather than risk slicing his hands trying to push them off.  Other people who’d thrown themselves to the sidewalk were also beginning to look around, stand up.  Sirens wailed in the distance – someone had probably called 911.

“Oh, hell, police.  That’s all I need.  Sheppard, get _off_.”

McKay seemed a bit groggy as John helped him stand.  He had a lump where his head had hit the sidewalk.  John himself was bleeding from minor cuts from the glass, but otherwise unharmed.  In fact, no one on the street looked to have been seriously injured.  McKay, pale and unsteady on his feet, might well be the worst off.

“Hang in there, McKay.  There should be some EMTs here shortly.”

“No!  I mean, I don’t need medical help.  I mean, I probably do, but I can’t risk...  Just get me away from here.  Please.”

John considered.  The smart thing to do would be to walk away, avoid getting involved, let McKay handle the EMTs and the police on his own.  The not-quite-as-smart-but-not-completely-stupid thing to do would be to take McKay to the hospital and drop him in front of the Emergency Department entrance.

The really, really stupid thing to do would be to take him back to John’s apartment, because as far as John knew, McKay didn’t – yet – know where he lived.  But he _did_ already know where John worked, and the campus was fairly deserted now that they were between terms.

***

“So, McKay, who’s trying to kill you and why?”

Washed, bandaged and supplied with fresh coffee, McKay looked considerably less likely to pass out at any minute.  John had generously allowed him to appropriate the one comfortable chair in the office, the one behind John’s desk.  He didn’t point out to McKay that this gave John an excuse to position himself on one of the less comfortable chairs between McKay and the door.

“This time or in general?  Some days it seems as if the entire gal – wait a moment, what makes you think it’s just me?”

“Oh, maybe the little detail that the _only_ place on that street that got shot up was the storefront we were standing in front of?”

“Which means that whoever it was might be trying to kill _you_!  Or both of us!”

“McKay, no one’s ever tried to kill me, not in the 15 years I’ve lived here, not at any time before that.  Nor am I the one who’s in town on some kind of classified business, _supposedly_ for the government.  I’m also not the one who wants to avoid talking to the police.”

“Uh, I was worried about complications.  I didn’t know what kind of IDs you’d given me.”

“_I’d_ given you?  All right, McKay, I want the whole story and I want it _now_.”

“Fine.  We’re in a virtual reality that _you_ created and I wasn’t sure you’d bothered to supply me with any IDs, let alone IDs of sufficient quality and backed up by sufficient data to pass if the police run a background check.”

“Whoa, stop.  First, we are _not_ in a reality I created.  Second, if we were, I’d be able to control how the police reacted.  Third, we’re not.”

“You’re repeating yourself.”

“It bears repeating.  This is not a virtual reality.  This is _real_ reality, McKay.”

“Says the man whose body has been lying in an Ancient stasis pod for the past two weeks!”

“What, you couldn’t buy me a new ‘stasis pod’?”

“Not ancient, you idiot, _Ancient_...  Hey, does this mean you believe me about the stasis pod?”

“No, it means that you don’t recognize sarcasm when you hear it.  Why am I supposed to be in this pod thing?”

“Oh.  Uh, there was an attack.  On P2P-915.  And I...  Things went wrong.  You got shot.  More than once.  You were...  It wasn’t good.  Okay, it was bad.  It was so bad that – remember that room we found that’s probably an Ancient medical lab?”

“Does it matter if I say ‘no’?”

“Not really.  There’s a medical lab, it’s got stasis pods that appear to be modified for use as healing environments.” 

“And I’m inside one.”

“You won’t come out!  The readings show that physically, you’re fine, but we can’t get the thing to deactivate!  There’s supposed to be an override, but it’s not working – Keller thinks maybe the strength of your gene is giving you too much control over it.”

“My gene.”

“Your ATA gene?  The one that makes Ancient technology roll over and beg for you?”

“Interesting metaphor there, McKay.  What were we doing on P2-whatever to begin with?”      

“It was a mission, a first contact mission.  We go on missions, you’re the team leader, I’m on your team.  And also the Chief Science Officer, of course.”

“Of course.  Where are these missions supposed to be based from?  Where’s ‘home’, McKay?”

“Atlantis.”

“Atlantis.”

“You’re the military commander of Atlantis.  It’s an Ancient city in the Pegasus galaxy.”

John lost it.  He couldn’t help himself, couldn’t keep from laughing until his eyes started to tear up.  McKay’s red-faced glare kept setting him off again.

“So-, so-, sorry, McKay!  That’s brilliant.  That’s fucking brilliant!”

“Hey, genius here!”

“Brilliantly imaginative, totally insane genius!  Fucking bri-, bri-, ohmigod, my sides hurt!”

“Sorry to hear that, _Colonel_, I’m not feeling particularly sympathetic at the moment!”

“Colonel?”

“Lieutenant Colonel, actually.  You’re a lieutenant colonel in the United States Air Force.”

“Did we know each other in kindergarten or something?  No, really.  You look about my age.  And the whole Air Force thing, that was a kid’s dream.”

“Aha!  You admit to an ‘Air Force thing’!”

“Yes, McKay, I admit that when I was a kid, I wanted to join the Air Force.”

“Then what happened?”

“I grew up.”

“So now you’re a math instructor at a community college.”

“Whereas _you_ are a brilliantly imaginative, totally insane genius whom someone has tried to kill in my company – twice.  Maybe we should focus on _that_ issue.”

“It’s _your_ reality.  Maybe you’re mad at me,” suggested McKay glumly.

“It’s _not _my reality, it’s plain old reality.  Look, have you had some kind of breakdown recently?”

“What makes you think I’ve had a...”

“Because you’re so delusional that you can’t have been this way for long, not and still be wandering around loose.”

“Hey!”

“My guess?  You really _are_ involved in some kind of top-secret work, you’ve had a breakdown or something and someone is trying to kill you to keep you from spilling what you know.”

“Okay, _now_ who’s being ‘brilliantly imaginative, totally insane’?”

“So what’s _your_ hypothesis, genius?”    

“You’ve heard my hypothesis, you laughed at it.  Stasis pod, virtual reality, you’re trying to kill me because you’re mad at me.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, McKay.  I’ve never killed anyone and I’m not about to start now.”  McKay jerked his head up from the contemplation of his now-empty coffee cup and stared at John, blue eyes wide in his flushed face, looking crazy and vulnerable.   John’s next words slipped out before he could think them over.  “And I could never stay angry too long at someone who looked like you.”

McKay’s jaw dropped.  John gave himself a mental slap upside the head.  He’d just hit on a guy who not only wasn’t in his right mind but _also_ had someone trying to kill him.  Just because he found McKay attractive...

Shit.  Even someone as socially clueless as McKay could have figured out that John was interested.  And the cluelessness might be an act.  Ditto for the craziness.  What if McKay was _acting_ vulnerable in order to get John to lower his guard?  Distracting him with an incredible story to hide – what was McKay hiding?

“Relax, McKay.  I’m just joking,” John told the other man as his mind raced.  Truth or lie?  How to tell?  And if a lie – why?

“Right.  Joking.  You’d have to be joking to say something like that.”  McKay’s tone was either genuinely bleak, or the man was one hell of an actor.

If McKay was telling the truth, then he needed help.  If he was lying, then playing along might be the only way to find out what was really going on.

“Enough with the joking, then.  You need help, and you can’t stay here. Do you have someplace safe to go?”

“Generally speaking?  No.  Safety is a relative concept in the Pegasus galaxy.  But if you mean safe from getting killed in this VR, yes, I can leave anytime.  But I’m not going to unless you come with me.”

Aha, back to _that_ again.  “Come with me,“ had been McKay’s refrain from the first.  Now he was glaring at John with his arms crossed and his chin stuck out, as if he were trying to look tough.  He _did_ look tough, sort of, but mostly John noticed how the pose accentuated his shoulders and arms.  Which might – or might not – be exactly what McKay _wanted_ him to notice.  John’s head was starting to hurt. 

Had McKay found a place that he genuinely _believed_ was his imaginary city?  Or was he trying to lure John somewhere – and if so, where and why?  Refusing to go anywhere with McKay would be the smart, safe thing to do.  Except then John might never get any answers.

“Okay, let’s go.”

“What?  Now?  Never mind, don’t answer that – you’re right.  We’re going.  I’ll just...”  McKay fished some sort of remote from his pocket, punched buttons.  “Right.  We’ve got a portal two metres in that direction.”  He waved at the door leading out into the hallway.  John regarded it cautiously.  Wanting to find out what was going on with McKay and wanting the guy at his back were two different things.

“Go ahead then, McKay – after you.”

“Uh, I think you should... I think we should...”

“What, you want me to hold your hand?  If I’m your ‘team leader’, aren’t you supposed to follow my orders?”

McKay flinched as if slapped, marched over to the door and opened it.  He was just stepping through when the phone on John’s desk rang.  John glanced over at it reflexively, decided to let his voicemail take the call, looked back at the door and –

McKay was gone.  Gone from the doorway, gone from the hall, gone from the front of the building.  Gone from the building’s janitor’s closets, washrooms and staircases.

Gone.

***

_“He was right behind me!  I opening a portal using the monitoring control – I thought that would be faster than trying to convince Sheppard to turn the VR off on his own.  He insisted I go through first, he still doesn’t trust me.  I figured if I could just get him through, we could argue about it later, but when I turned around, the portal had already closed.  Maybe he closed it.  It’s _his_ VR.  Maybe he’ll never let me back in.”_

_“God, he said he’d never killed anyone, no one had ever tried to kill him.  Maybe he doesn’t want to come back out.”_

***

He needed this, sun and salt water, power and motion that couldn’t be controlled, only balanced on, ridden.  He hadn’t been sleeping well, waking abruptly from dreams he couldn’t remember, sweating with fear, aching with loss.  He saw people he thought he knew in the street, on campus, in stores.  When he looked again, they’d be gone – and then he’d realize he didn’t really know anyone who resembled them anyway.

One time, a teenaged cashier had looked up from the cash register to hand John his change, and for a moment the kid’s face had been inhuman, gaunt, with long white hair.  No one else nearby had noticed.

Here and now he could let it all go, be only his body, muscle and bone, balance and reflexes reacting – almost _pre_acting – to the wave that carried him, rolling forward, picking up speed, reaching towards... Shit!

The flash of unexpected colour in the water before him startled John for critical seconds.  He lost the wave, lost his balance, his body going one way as the surfboard went another.  Momentarily stunned as he hit the water, he got himself reoriented, swam towards the light of the surface, broke through.  He was sure he’d seen – yes!

McKay was floundering and flailing, but still afloat.  Not wanting to be accidentally dragged down, John stayed out of reach as he yelled, “McKay!  Hey, over here!  McKay!”

“Wh – wh – Sheppard?!”

“Can you swim to shore from here?”

“Which way?”

John grinned.  “Follow me!”

Not surprisingly, McKay was a decent swimmer.  He had good shoulders for it, and his body type helped him float.  After they recaptured the errant surfboard on the way back in, they were able to use it for additional buoyancy.  Still, both men were fairly winded by the time they hit the beach and sprawled out on the sand.

After a moment, John propped himself up on his elbows.  “All right, McKay, I was _not_ the one trying to kill you this time!  Actually, it looked more like some weird kind of suicide attempt.”

“Pot, kettle.  You’re the suicidal one, Sheppard!”

“Am not.  Surfing’s not that dangerous.”

“I didn’t mean surfing, I meant – no, forget it, you won’t remember anyway.”

“Fine.  Want to tell me how and why you suddenly appeared in the water?”

“The monitoring control opens a portal and delivers me within two metres of wherever you are.”

“Say again?”

“The monitoring control that gives me access to your VR when you’re in this particular model of stasis pod.  You have primary control, the monitoring control just allows me to come and go so I can...”

“Monitor.”

“Right.  Uh, do you believe anything I’m saying?”

“Nope.  C’mon, I left my stuff further up the beach.”

***

“If you take those off, they’ll dry faster.”

“Unless you happen to have spare change of clothes...”

“McKay, there’s no one else here.  This beach is out of the way, plus it’s a weekday.  No one’s going to call the police on you, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“I’m _mainly_ worried about sunburn, I have very sensitive skin!”

“I have sunscreen.”

“What, SPF 2½?”

“Up to you, Mr. Sensitive Skin, but those clothes are going to chafe.”

“That’s _Dr._ Sensitive Skin to you and... okay, you’ve got a point.”  McKay hesitated, then almost defiantly pulled his shirt off.  He’d already shed his sodden shoes and socks for the walk along the beach, so his pants followed the shirt in short order.  He retained the boxers with the atomic energy symbols.

John enjoyed the view as the other man bent over to spread his wet clothes out to dry.  The soaked boxers weren’t hiding much.  When McKay turned to look at him, he patted the vacant half of the beach blanket in invitation.

“Your sunscreen, Dr. Skin,” drawled John as he handed the tube over.  Sure enough, McKay flushed, then immediately became extremely busy applying the lotion.  John grinned and watched out of the corner of his eye.  Sooner or later it was going to dawn on McKay that he’d need help with his back. 

***

“So was I right?  About grad school and surfing?”

“Whuh?”  John hadn’t mean to drop off, certainly not with McKay sitting there, but the sun and salt air, exercise and recent lack of sleep had conspired jointly against him.  He looked up to find McKay – with John’s help, now thoroughly anointed with sunscreen – studying him with some interest.  He also realized he was enjoying the attention. 

Having McKay appear in the water from nowhere had been so freakish that it seemed to have short-circuited something in John’s mind.  He had no way to explain the situation and no idea what to do about it, so he focused on the immediate issues.  McKay’s clothes needed to dry.  In the meantime John had nothing better to do than enjoy the sun and McKay’s company.

“It was sort of the other way around.  Grad school was... more serious than I expected.  Math had always been a way to – feel freer, I guess.  It made a different space inside my head.  Like riding a wave.”

“Like flying.”  McKay nodded.  “That actually makes sense to me.  So, you were looking for freedom and instead you found...”

“Serious people expecting me to be serious too.  I got tired of it.  I’d been planning to go for a doctorate, but instead I left after I got my master’s.  My old plans didn’t fit anymore and I didn’t have any new ones.  So I moved out here where I could spend my time surfing while I was figuring out what to do next.”

McKay snorted.  “How did that work for you?”

“Pretty well, actually.  A couple of the guys I got to know from surfing were taking the same math course at the community college.  The instructor was a jerk, but that was no reason for my buddies to crash and burn.  So I started – tutoring sessions, I guess.  Drawing trig diagrams in the sand.”

“I always knew you were a geek at heart, Sheppard.”

“Yeah, like you’ve known me so long, McKay.  Anyway, word got around that I was willing and able to help other guys out.”

John chose his words carefully and watched McKay, smiling to himself as caught the other man’s moment of startlement.

“The thing is, I liked it, so I applied at the college and started teaching part-time.  Then one of the full-time instructors was shot during a mugging.  The college needed to fill the position fast, I was there, so I sort of got shoved into it.”

“And you’ve been doing this for the past _15_ years?  How do you stand it, putting up with idio –“

“Hey, stop right there, McKay!  Not everyone’s a genius.  A lot of our students, they’ve managed to get through the public school system without really learning anything – including how to learn.  They come to us because it’s finally dawned on them that in the real world, they have to have real knowledge and skills in order to get where they want to go.  My job is to make sure that no one who’s willing to work for that gets left behind.”

“Leave no man behind?”

“Damn right.”

“Huh.  Surfing makes you talkative, Sheppard.  I don’t think I’ve ever heard you talk this much about yourself before.”

“Uh, McKay, this is only the fourth time we’ve met.”

“No, I mean in real...”

“You mean your lieutenant colonel.  Maybe the military drained the words out of the guy.”  John heard the bitterness in his own voice, saw that McKay heard it too.

“Sheppard, you said you thought about joining the Air Force as a kid.  What happened?”

“Puberty.”

“Why would – oh.  The bar the other night...”

“Wow, you really _are_ a genius.”

“Wow, your sarcasm is getting really obvious.  So you hit puberty, realized you were attracted to men...”

“And my friend’s older brother got booted out of the Army.  This was before Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.  The guy got harassed, beaten and finally kicked out because a high school buddy sent him a postcard with some remarks that the guys in the mailroom picked up and spread around.  Want to know the sickest part of the whole deal?  He’d been trying to keep his nose clean.  Hadn’t been with another guy since he joined up.”

“Oh.  Well, obviously the American military is run by morons – “

“If the morons are the ones making the rules, then it doesn’t really matter that they’re morons, McKay.”

“Yes, it does!  It has to – “  

“Because if being a moron doesn’t matter, then neither does being a genius?” John snapped.  His own anger surprised him.

“I think my clothes should be dry by now.”  McKay’s mouth was a tight, slanted line as he got to his feet.

“Wait!  Sit down.  I’m sorry.  It’s not your fault, just...  McKay, sit down!  Do you need more sunscreen?  Some water?”

McKay huffed and sat down again, accepted a bottle of water.  John watched his Adam’s apple bob as he drank.  McKay’s light brown hair had turned fluffy as it dried.  John wondered if he’d been blond as a child – his skin was pale enough, pale and lightly furred across his chest.  Even with the sunscreen he was turning a bit pink.

“So, your lieutenant colonel.”

“He’s not ‘my’ lieutenant colonel.  He’s also you.  I mean, you’re him.”

“Am I?  _He_ went ahead and joined the Air Force.  Or maybe he’s not gay – is he?”

“I... don’t know.”

“Is that your official line?”

“No!  I really don’t know.  I can’t exactly ask, can I?”

“Dunno.  Can you?  You said he was your ‘team leader’.  Is that all?”

“We’re friends.”

“Which means what?’

“Movies.  Video golf.  Beer.  Saving each other’s lives.”

“Yeah, I can see how you’d need someone to do that for you.”

“Hey, I save his just as often!  Well, almost as often.  Pretty often.”

“What else does he do for you, McKay?”  When McKay looked up, John caught the other man’s eyes with his own.  Blue, blue eyes, and all that pale skin.  Still looking into McKay’s eyes, John reached out to touch him, stroke lightly down his chest.  “Does he do this for you?”

McKay’s breath hitched.  “No, he, you.  You don’t do that.”

“I’m doing it now,” John replied quietly.  He’d been wanting to ever since McKay had stripped off, had been thinking about it as they lay on the blanket together, separated by hardly more than a foot of space.  Now they were close enough that he could smell McKay’s sunscreen and sweat, McKay’s scent mixing in with his own.  He raised his hand to McKay’s jaw.

“Does he do this?”  John leaned forward and kissed that slanting mouth, lightly the first time.  The second time he licked along McKay’s salty lips, felt them start to open – and then they were gone.

“I, I’m... not here to do this.  This isn’t the reason I’m here.”

“Isn’t it?  The night we left the bar together you seemed ready enough to... connect.”

“Yes, well, what’s one more weird but necessary alien ritual?”

“One _more_ alien ritual?”

“Never mind!  What I mean is, this is different.  It’s – it’s more real.”

“_I’m_ real, Rodney.”

“I should be going.  Thanks for, uh, the sunscreen!  And everything.  And.”

“Okay, sorry.  You don’t need to run away.”

“I’m not running away!”

“Fine.  Then come back into town with me.  We can get a beer or dinner or something.  The vanishing act is getting old.”

***

“_This_ is your car, Sheppard?”

“Hey, it’s reliable!  It’s just a bit – battle-scarred.  What were you expecting, McKay?”

“I don’t know – something more...”  McKay’s hands described curving lines in the air.  “A convertible?  Maybe a Mustang.  In some dramatic colour – black or cherry red or something.  With manual transmission.”

“One out of four.  And how much do you think community college instructors earn, anyway?”

“What part of ‘virtual’ don’t you understand?  You could imagine any car you wanted!”

“That’s a hell of a statement coming from a guy who stopped me from kissing him because it was ‘more real.’”

“I wasn’t referring to your rattling, shoebox-sized deathtrap of a car!”

And damn Rodney McKay for looking so good, standing there with his hands on his (now khaki-clad) hips as he insulted John’s car.  John strode around the car to the passenger side, opened the door and raised his eyebrows as he pointedly held it for McKay.  Who got in.

Sheppard got them underway, choosing the winding coastal road that cut along the cliffs rather than the highway.  He liked the road for its ocean views.  And, if he were being honest with himself, he wanted to prolong his afternoon with McKay.  Prolonging McKay’s continuing rant about his car was another matter.

“So, Atlantis?” John interrupted.

“Yes, as I told you before, it’s an Ancient city in the –“

“Pegasus galaxy.  Got it the first time.  I’m guessing there’s an ocean involved?”

“It’s a floating city.”

“Nice.  Good surfing?”

“Uh, no.”

“Your lieutenant colonel not only chose to become career military, he let himself get stationed somewhere there’s no surfing?”

“He didn’t know there wasn’t!  At least, I’m assuming he wouldn’t have brought a surfboard if he _had_ known.  Although, really, that would be entirely typical...  Look, after Afghanistan and Antarctica, _any_ ocean access would be an improvement.”

“First desert, then ice, then an ocean without surfing.  McKay, your friend?  Is an idiot.”

“That’s exactly what I’m always telling him!  I mean, you!  Damn it, now you’ve got me doing it.  Sheppard, you _are_ him.”

“Yeah, sure.  He – hey!”

“What?  Oh!  Where’d that other car come from?”

“Dunno, but the driver’s a fool to take this road so fast.”

“He’s closing up on us...”

“...and not signaling that he’s going to pass.”

“Stupid American driv –“

“Another member of your fan club, McKay?”  John gave the rear view mirror a grim look.  The other car was right on his tail.  He couldn’t make out the driver’s face, but there was at least one passenger.

“Why are you blaming me?  At least he’s not shooting at us!”

“Yet.  Shit!”  The first shots rang out as if McKay’s words had been a signal.  No apparent hits, but the road curved up ahead.  John knew he was going too fast, way too fast considering the height of the cliffs rising on one side of them and falling on the other.  But slowing down didn’t seem like the thing to do with the other car taking potshots at them.

“I don’t suppose your deathtrap has airbags, Colonel!”

“Shut up, McKay!  I’m going to try –“

Which was when another round of shots managed to hit at least one of their rear tires.  The car hit the curve already careening out of control, slammed into and through the guard rail, and they were flying.  John couldn’t stop the numbers from running through his head – downward acceleration 9.8 metres per square second, vertical distance 400 feet...

And everything changed.  The car melted, shifted, expanded around them, the dashboard and steering wheel metamorphosing into some kind of console with control sticks, buttons, HUDs.  It took John a moment to realize the strangest part: they hadn’t hit ground yet.  They’d only had approximately five seconds before they hit, but the impact hadn’t come yet.

“We’re hovering, Sheppard.”  McKay pointed to something on one of the HUDs.

“You familiar with this set up, McKay?”

“Yes, and so are you.  Are you going to set us down?”

“I don’t think...”

“Right, fine, move over!”  McKay didn’t so much push John out of the way as climb over him in order to take control of the...

“McKay, what _is_ this thing?”

“Working!”  McKay’s brow was furrowed as he brought the – aircraft? – down on the sand with just a bit of a thump.  “Ha, you don’t get to complain about that landing, Sheppard, not when I had to take over for you!”

“I wasn’t going to complain, McKay.  What is this thing?”

“A jumper – puddlejumper.  It’s a small ship that goes through a stargate.”

“Who the hell decided to name it a puddlejumper?”

McKay’s jaw dropped.  Then he grinned broadly.  “You did!”

John turned away and studied the inside of the “jumper”, trying to get control of his growing anger.

“Don’t worry about your car, Sheppard.  We can use the jumper to get us back to town.  Or we can just skip that and go...”

“Nice try, McKay, but your trick’s not going to work.”

“What?”

“I thought someone was trying to kill you, but you’re the one _creating_ these attacks.”  John glared at McKay, narrow-eyed.

McKay glared right back.  “I’m creating attacks on myself?  I don’t think so, Sheppard, I already told you, I’m not the suicidal one!  Why would I be trying to...”

“Because your lieutenant colonel is military.  I don’t know how you’re doing it, but _you’re_ creating these situations to try and force me into responding the way _he_ would.”

“You _are_ him, Sheppard!”

“I’m not him, I don’t _want_ to be him!”

“You can’t...”

“Yes, I can.  Now get out.”

“Out of the jumper?”

“Out!  Away!  Wherever you go, wherever you vanish to.”

“Sheppard, I’m trying to bring you home.”

“You don’t know where home is for me.  Go away.  Don’t come back.”

“Sheppard, look...”

“Go.  Away.  Now.”

McKay dug the remote out of his pocket, pushed buttons, took a step forward, turned.

“John...”

But John stared back, unyielding.  Still looking at him, McKay took another step – and vanished.

The “puddlejumper” remained, stubbornly refusing to turn back into John’s car.  Which, in any case, would have been destroyed by the crash.  John sighed and started walking along the beach to look for some way to get back up the cliffs to the road.

He was going to have to hitchhike back into town.  And buy a new car.  And a new surfboard.

***

After that, it all started to unravel.  The only reality John remembered knowing – his apartment, the campus where he taught, the town in which he’d lived so many years – started to fade in and out, alternating with the alien architecture of a completely different place.  He’d be walking down a sunny street and suddenly find himself surrounded by cool, blue-green walls and stained glass windows.  People’s appearances melted, shifted even as he watched.

His life was peeling away from him like a snake’s outgrown skin.  In the end, he had no choice but to accept its loss.

***

“Colonel!  Colonel Sheppard!  Can you understand me?”

His eyelids felt gummy, but he pried them open in response to Keller’s voice.  “Yeah.  ‘nfirm’ry?”

“Yes, Colonel, you’re in the infirmary.”

“How long?”

“Five weeks.  We were getting worried.  The good news is that your physical injuries appear to be completely healed – I’m just finishing the last scans now.”

“And the bad news...”

“Is that I’m _not_ immediately releasing you for active duty, so don’t even bother asking.”

John didn’t have a chance to reply before Rodney skidded into the infirmary, face red and chest heaving.  “Jennifer!  On the radio, you said...”

“He’s right here, Rodney, he’s fine.”

John stared, trying to make the pieces in his mind match up.  That was Rodney McKay standing there, all flushed and heated.  That was his team-mate and his best friend.  But it was also the Rodney McKay who’d walked into his office a few weeks ago, the guy with whom he’d spent an evening in a bar, an afternoon on a beach.  The man before him was the man he’d kissed _and_ the man he’d never let himself think about kissing.

He didn’t know what to say.  Rodney was saying plenty, of course – “virtual reality” and “thank god” and “kill you if you _ever_ do that again” – but John could only stare at him.  When Keller said she needed blood samples, John thankfully turned away from Rodney to pay attention to her instead.  Ronon and Teyla showed up while Keller was doing her vampire act and he _could_ think of things to say to them, so he said them.  Then Keller needed _more_ blood samples and Lorne dropped by briefly and by the time John ran out of people who _weren’t _Rodney McKay to deal with, Rodney was gone.

***

As jail cells in the Pegasus galaxy went, this one wasn’t bad.  Dirt floor, rock walls, bars – the usual.  They hadn’t received much in the way of gratuitous beatings to add to their injuries from the fight.  Neither one of them was manacled.  Best of all, Teyla and Ronon were nowhere in sight, which meant that they might have been able to get away and get help.

None of this seemed to be doing much to cheer Rodney up, although John had tried pointing it out to him as soon as he was able to talk coherently.  He’d regained consciousness with Rodney hovering over him, muttering something about a concussion.  When was Rodney going to learn that a lump on the head – admittedly an extremely sore lump – didn’t always indicate a concussion?  Sometimes, sure, but not _always_.

“At least you can’t blame me for not following orders this time!” 

John hurriedly tuned into Rodney’s rant.  “Was I blaming you, McKay?”

“If you were going to, you can’t.  You said run, I ran.”

“Yeah, smack into a guard.”

“He jumped out of an alley!  If you knew he was there, why did you tell me to run that way?”

“Because _I_ didn’t know he was there either!”

“That’s my whole point!  It’s your _job_ to know things like that, so if you didn’t know, I couldn’t have been expected to know, so it’s not my fault, so it can’t make things any worse!”  Rodney had a mulish look to him.

“Any worse than _what_, McKay?”

“Than since P2P-915!”

“P2-what?” 

“P2P-915?  Where you were shot – damn near fatally – because you told me to run and instead I delayed to grab some equipment I thought was worth it and you delayed your own retreat to cover me?”

“One, that’s my job, and two, that was more than two months ago, McKay.”

“Precisely!  That was more than two months ago, so it’s time you got over it!”

“I am!  I’m so over it that you’re not making any sense!”

“Then why have you been avoiding me ever since Keller released you from the infirmary?”

John managed to catch his reflexive, “Have not!” but didn’t know what else to say.  Looking at Rodney still made him feel as if he was seeing double.  He’d been trying to... Yeah, the genius was right after all.  It was time John got over it.  Too bad he didn’t know how.

“Ha!  I notice you’re not arguing that point, Colonel.”

“Because it’s complete bullshit, McKay.  And you’ve been avoiding me too.”  Which was the truth, if not the whole truth, and anyway...

Anyway, that’s when the wall exploded.

***

Keller agreed with John that the bump on his head was not a concussion and that his assorted gashes, slashes and bruises were nothing serious.  Once assured that no one else was injured – and having expressed suitable appreciation for the heroic rescue to Teyla, Ronon and the six marines they’d brought back – John was able to escape from the infirmary.

He knew that from some things, there was no escape.  Sure enough, Rodney marched into his quarters that evening.

“All right, Colonel, you said that I’ve been avoiding you?  Fine.  This is me no longer avoiding you.”

“Fine, this is me listening.”

“And this is me asking a question.  If you weren’t angry at me, why wouldn’t you leave the VR?”

“I did leave the VR.  You poked enough holes in it that it started falling apart and I had to leave.”

“Oh.”  Some of the belligerence drained out of Rodney’s stance.  “You sound as if... you would have wanted to stay.”

“Look, Rodney, I’ve been all through this with Dr. Rodriguez.”

“Did you want to stay because it was safe?”

That’s only one of the reasons, thought John.

“I mean safe until the attacks started,” Rodney clarified.  “And for the record, I was _not_ the one creating them.”

“Rodriguez’s best guess is that _I_ was.”

“What?  Okay, Rodriguez is a psychologist.  You understand that means she’s a practitioner of one of the darker forms of voodoo?”

“Yeah, well according to voodoo, subconsciously I recognized you as someone I’m supposed to protect.  So the VR helpfully tried to bring that recognition to the surface by creating situations in which I would have to protect you.”

“Protect me from cars, bullets...”

“Hey, we’re lucky we didn’t get hit by a swarm of flying lemons.”

“Very funny.  Uh, did it work?”

“My protection?  Apparently, you’re still alive.”  Rodney rolled his eyes as John smirked.

“Did it work to help you _recognize_ me?”

No, because I didn’t want to.  No, because I had reasons not to want to.  No, because I want...  John realized that Rodney was watching him intently, waiting for an answer.

“Nah.”

“So you hadn’t yet recognized me when you...”  Rodney paused, swallowed, resumed more softly.  “John, what you told me about your friend’s brother – was that true?”

“Yeah.”

“And it was... personally significant to you?”

“Yeah.”

“You haven’t been avoiding me because I almost got you killed?”

Was it John’s imagination, or was Rodney’s voice getting a bit husky?  His gaze had slipped off John, allowing John to watch _him_ instead.  Allowing John to slip closer.

“Nah.” 

“Have you been avoiding me because I – poked holes in your paradise?”

John felt his mouth begin to curl into a grin.  “Well, I’m a _little_ annoyed about that.  I thought the standard method of getting someone to leave paradise was to offer them temptation.”

Damned if Rodney didn’t start to flush.  “We seem to have done that... the other way around.  You were the one who, uh...”

“And you’re the one who said it was too real, Rodney.”  So close now, John spoke softly.

“You’ve been avoiding me because I said no?”

“Because...  When I joined the Air Force, I thought I had to make choices.  Those choices may not be as absolute as I thought back then, but there’s still a risk.”

“I understand that, John.”

“And if I took that risk and you said...”

“Yes.  I’m saying yes.  I should have said yes that day.  Am I too late?”

This close, it was easy to reach out.  Easy to touch, easy to taste.  So _much_ to taste.  Had it always been this easy, and both of them blind?

“What’s funny?”  He could feel his own breath reflecting back at him from Rodney’s warm skin. 

“I’m thinking about...”

“Rodney, if you’re still thinking, I’m doing something wrong here.”

“Oh, but I’m imagining...  Yes, do that again.”

“Imagining?”

“Mmmm.”

“Imagining, Rodney?”

“You in a figleaf.”


End file.
